REPORT OF THE STATE BOTANIST I904 



4 7 



with age to brownish and then to a dark sepia color. The mouths 

 are large and angular. In some cases shorter dissepiments within 

 the larger tubes give them the appearance of being composed of 

 two or more smaller ones. The tube walls extend downward on 

 the stem to the ring and by anastomosing give the reticulated ap- 

 pearance called crib rose in the older descriptions. This is one of 

 the distinguishing characters between the larch boletus and the 

 Elba boletus. I have not yet tested the edible qualities of the latter, 

 but the former is worthy of a place among our esculent species. It 

 was collected in October. 



Boletus rubropunctus Pk. 



^RED DOTTED BOLETUS 

 PLATE 90, FIG. I-9 



Pileus fleshy, very convex or broadly convex, glabrous, viscid 

 and shining when moist, variable in color, pale red, crimson or bay 

 red, flesh white; tubes plane or convex in the mass, depressed 

 around the stem, their mouths small, round, pale yellow when 

 young, becoming bright golden yellow; stem equal or slightly 

 thickened toward the base, solid, punctate or minutely squamulose 

 with red or pallid points, pallid or tinged with red; spores oblong 

 fusiform, .0005-. 0007 of an inch long, .0002-. 00024 broad. 



The red dotted boletus is a very variable species. The cap is 

 strongly or slightly convex, smooth and shining, viscid when moist 

 and covered with a thin tenacious pellicle which can be torn away 

 like the skin from an overripe peach. In the young plant the thin 

 margin sometimes extends a little beyond the mass of tubes. In 

 color the cap may be pale red, bright red or crimson, reddish brown 

 or chestnut color. The flesh is whitish, sometimes tinged with yel- 

 low. The tubes are plane or convex in the mass, depressed around 

 the stem, pale yellow when young, becoming bright golden yellow 

 with age. Their mouths are small and round. The stem is rather 

 long and slender for the size of the cap, solid, equal in diameter in 

 all its parts or sometimes slightly thicker at the base. It is marked 

 with numerous small dots or points of a red, brownish or pallid 

 color which at first sight suggests a similarity to the stem of a small 

 specimen of Boletus scaber. The color of the stem may be 

 whitish, pallid or reddish. The species is related to Boletus 

 i n f 1 e x u s Pk. but it differs from it in having its tubes depressed 

 about the stem, in its tube mouths being destitute of red granules 

 and in its larger spores. 



The cap is 1-2.5 inches broad; the stem is 1-3 inches long, 2-4 

 lines thick. It occurs in thin woods in July and August. 



